Does Coffee or Green Tea break your fast?

Will drinking Coffee or Green Tea break your fast? Let's find out if these two popular drinks are Intermittent Fasting friendly or not...

Does Coffee Break Your Fast? Photo: Adobe Stock

If you’re trying to work out whether Coffee or Green Tea will break your fast, then you’ve arrived in the right place.

An internet search for the substances that will and won’t break a fast returns millions of results, so it’s clearly a hot topic as Intermittent Fasting becomes more popular.

This article is going to walk you through the basic facts about what will and won’t break your fast, paying particular attention to Coffee and Green Tea, as they seem to be the two drinks on a lot of peoples’ lips.

Intermittent Fasting has become incredibly popular in recent years as more and more people look for natural ways to help speed up fat loss and manage their overall health.

But although the principle of intermittent fasting is a relatively simple one, there seems to be quite a lot of debate about what you can and can’t drink or consume during your ‘fasting window’.

1) What is Intermittent Fasting?

Intermittent Fasting (sometimes referred to as just IF), is the general term given to various eating patterns that involve fasting (simply not eating) for short periods of time.

There are many different intermittent fasting protocols.

One popular method is a daily 16-hour minimum fast with an eight-hour ‘eating window’. In this case, if you finish eating at 8pm, for example, you would fast until 12pm the following day. Other variations include a 24-hour fast, one day a week.

Intermittent Fasting has become increasingly popular Photo: Adobe Stock

There is a growing amount of evidence which suggests that fasting can bring about a host of health benefits, which is partly why it has become so popular.

3) Does Coffee or Green Tea break your fast?

Although Black Coffee does contain a minimal number of calories (for example, a Starbucks Espresso Shot contains 5 calories), it is generally accepted that it won’t break a fast.

Important note: Remember that we’re referring to BLACK coffee here. That means Coffee with no milk, sugar or sweeteners. Adding those substances to your Coffee would likely turn your drink into a fast-breaking nightmare.

Green Tea:

Like with Black Coffee, it is generally accepted that Green Tea won’t break your fast.

Green Tea is extremely low in calories – at around just 2 calories per 200ml.

Again, it’s important to remember that we’re talking about unsweetened Green Tea. That means no sugar, sweeteners or milk.

THE BOTTOM LINE: It is generally accepted that Coffee and Green Tea will not break your fast, as long as they are consumed in moderation and without any sugar, sweeteners or milk.

4) Other things that won’t (or will) break your fast

There are a few other things you can consume while intermittent fasting.

Water is an obvious one, and staying properly hydrated is a key part of maintaining your overall health.

Consuming Branched Chain Amino Acids (BCAAs) is more of a grey area, because they may negate some of the benefits of fasting. That said, this is something of an area of debate that you should make your own mind up about.

5) Anything else to consider?

So, we’ve deduced that Black Coffee and Green Tea will not break your fast if you consume them in moderation and without sugar, sweeteners or milk.

The thing to bear in mind is that both of these popular drinks could actually be beneficial to consume while fasting.

That’s because, as we noted above, they have both been shown to be capable of increasing your metabolic rate, and potentially boosting your body’s fat burning capabilities.

So, we guess the real question should not be about whether Coffee or Green Tea will break your fast, but rather, why more people do not consume these two drinks regularly while practicing intermittent fasting?

How much Caffeine is in Green Tea and Coffee?

Of course, if you’re sensitive to Caffeine, then Green Tea may be a better option for you.

A Starbucks shot of Espresso contains around 90mg of Caffeine, while an 8-ounce cup of Green Tea contains between 30 and 50mg of Caffeine.

6) Conclusion

So, that brings us to the end of our article asking the question: ‘does Coffee or Green Tea break your fast?’.

As well as answering the main question, we’ve also taken a look at the various benefits of consuming both of these popular beverages.

The short answer to the big question is no, neither Green Tea nor Coffee will break your fast – as long as you don’t add any sugar, milk or sweeteners to them.

They both have minimal amounts of calories in them, and are pretty safe to consume in moderation.

In fact, consuming them while fasting could actually bring about some positive benefits, including potentially boosting fat loss and increasing your metabolic rate.